Didn’t someone mention in that glorious, lumbering, now late departed, (and lamented maybe ?) Hartman Grid thread, that the grid, whatever it is, “vibrates/ oscillates/ hums” at something like 200–250 Hz.
Can’t remember any details about that, but recently, while reading through Thos. Seeley’s latest book Honeybee Democracy, I came across an interesting factoid. On pg. 157 in the chapter on how scout bees get the rest of the colony revved up enough to launch out of their swarm cluster, we find:

"From our audio recordings of pipers sounding off near one of the microphones, we learned that each pipe is a single pulse of sound that lasts about one second and is composed of a fundamental frequency of 200 to 250 Hz. plus many harmonics…
"That the fundamental frequency of the piping sound matches the wing-beat frequency of a flying bee is strong evidence that a bee produces this sound by activating the flight muscles in her thorax to create strong vibrations in her body." My emphases added.

My, My but ain't that in'trestin'. Surely some aspiring entomologist could wring a doctoral dissertation out of such a tidbit.

Here's hoping that some of the many contributors to the original thread notice this and comment. IMHO it deserves a sticky note— ahem, ahem.

We had a member a few years ago who expounded a theory about placing hives on geopathic stress lines, because the resonance frequency corresponded to the vibration of the bees and helped to fortify the colony and enable them to cope with varroa amongst other benefits. I hope I summarized that correctly.

His name is John Harding and he wrote a book.... An Holistic way for the bees.

Unfortunately, whilst John is very passionate about bees and his ideas, he is perhaps not so capable of elucidating them, which is a real shame. His theories require you to take a leap of faith regarding dowsing/geopathic stress lines/Hartman grid which was probably the big stumbling block for many people.

There was much talk of doing some testing on dowsing.... to see how effective/replicable it is..... it's a shame we didn't have a go at our recent Northern Gathering, but then perhaps Avril would not be so keen for us to be digging up her lawns.

I'm afraid I'm a bit of a cynic when it comes to dowsing, but I am prepared to be convinced if several dowsers can all pinpoint the same places in a blind test. Of course, you would then have to convince me that the dowsers had pin pointed Hartman grid lines/geopathic stress lines and not just water courses and how do they detect different things and then it would take several years of hives on those spots with identical colonies in identical hives on neighbouring sites that were not indicated as stress lines for me to be convinced of the whole theory.

Of course you could site hives directly under where the bees swarm to, but this is usually impractical so then you have to decide how close the the actual location is sufficient to still be in the right place "on the grid"

My bees do well mostly in their current apiary location and there are a couple of other locations that I've tried that work less well, despite bees swarming to those locations on multiple occasions. Hives swarming to death and not trying to produce emergency queens when given eggs, or being overly defensive, so I'm not sold on some of the ideas, even disregarding human dowsing. I don't doubt that creatures can detect many things that we humans cannot, but I'm not convinced that the resting place for a swarm is anything other than a convenient place for the queen to put down and recover after her first short flight.

As a moderator/admin I am loath to make this a sticky at this point, because the theories are not proven. I will follow the topic with interest though.

There was a long thread on this the other year which I contributed to. Had I a large field in which to place my hives, I would have had a go by now but being limited to the allotment apiary and one other part of the allotment site makes it rather difficult to do a proper test.

There was a long thread on this the other year which I contributed to.

Yes Catcher, that thread and
"that glorious, lumbering, now late departed, (and lamented maybe ?) Hartman Grid thread"
are one and the same.

Barbara, you speak of two quite separate and different tests: The first test would determine if, in fact, "geopathic stress lines" could be delineated by ordinary mere mortals using simple means and methods.

Quote:

I'm afraid I'm a bit of a cynic when it comes to dowsing, but I am prepared to be convinced if several dowsers can all pinpoint the same places in a blind test. Of course, you would then have to convince me that the dowsers had pin pointed Hartman grid lines/geopathic stress lines

I described a way to design and execute just such a test back in the original thread. It would require as resources only a few people, an hour of time, and a few bucks worth of materials, but would clearly demonstrate the existence (or not) of the Grid. By 'demonstration' I mean as in iron-clad.
The second test, to determine the effect of hive placement on the grid, would be much more difficult and require the resources usually found only in larger institutions of learning, govt., or larger corporations. That's why the mention of a doctoral dissertation. I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for that to happen, however.

About the sticky-note thing, I was only thinking that might attract the attention of former thread contributors who wouldn't otherwise be alerted via email (due to the thread's having been lost, of course) that the thread was being revisited.

I have no problem with the subject being resurrected and discussed as I am open to a good logical argument but I do not feel the topic is worthy of "sticky" status purely for the purpose of bringing it to the attention of those people who may be interested in the discussion.

It is not a "must read" for anyone interested in bee health in my opinion.

Most regular contributors use the "View posts since last visit" button to keep up to date with the forum and will therefore spot this thread via that means.

From what I remember, I personally wasn't convinced by your suggested test on the previous thread of whether "mere mortals" were able to plot a grid let alone a grid specifically of geopathic stress lines, be they Curry Grid or Hartman lines.
I can almost accept that people can find water this way, although I believe other, possibly subconscious factors, may play a part in it, but I don't see how you take a water dowser and then somehow change their detection setting to Hartman or Curry or geopathic stress lines and set them off again. It's not like turning a dial on an instrument to measure something different and I'm not convinced they are all the same.... or that they in fact exist.
Sorry, but I've got a long way to go on this topic before I even get close to excited about it.

Whilst there is some extremely limited evidence for dowsing for water or oil, that evidence points to dowsers using subtle environmental cues rather than it being based on woo-woo ley lines. In other words, it only works when the dowser has some unconscious knowledge of where the target is on the basis of, for example, clues from vegetation, geography or temperature. They might not realise what they’re doing and so believe in the supernatural "power" of the divining rods. Experiments have been done that eliminate these possibilities by running water through one of several pipes laid underground. Under such controlled conditions all supernatural capacities to divine melt away.

As for "Hartman Grids", I am bound to say I find them even more fanciful than ley lines. I strongly urge anyone to look up Hartman and his crackpot theories of locationally based human pathologies. Anyone who takes even the most cursory glance at the biography of this man will, I would argue, find a self deluded fool at best and a charlatan at worst.

These are just my opinions of course and so anyone is entirely free to differ.

As for a sticky, I ask the mods to note that the OP has cheekily contrived to resurrect this topic from 'The far Side' - from whence there should be no return!

Am I the OP here? (whatever is an OP anyway?) If so, many sincere thanks for the high compliment —the cheeky part for sure, but I'm fairly sure it's premature since I really don't think I hauled this thread over from the far side. At least not intentionally.

As to sticky note attention, OK,OK,OK, I'll concede the point. The elicited response is showing a sticky to be superfluous anyway. Yes-s-s!

Now, back to the topic.
Does anyone remember the frequency that the grid was alleged to "vibrate" at? (Hey! die-hard Materialists out there! Didja notice those quotes " " and the italicized words above? Uh? Uh?)

Thanks, Andy to you as well: "Yet with a set of rods I do find lines. To me they are there..." The key word in your whole post was the simple "yet" ... . This supports my contention that the presumption: The Inexplicable = The Mystical = The Non-Existant is wholly, well, presumptive and at least partially false. There.
I'll let someone else slosh the pot at bit now.

.....This supports my contention that the presumption: The Inexplicable = The Mystical = The Non-Existant is wholly, well, presumptive and at least partially false....

The inexplicable merely = the inexplicable until evidence is provided that renders it no longer inexplicable. That's it really. Hypotheses are fine, of course, and require no evidence, at least initially. But, for them to hang around for any length of time or to be taken in any way seriously to the point where they may be regarded as having progressed to theories, they must be at least amenable to evidence. That is to say, they must be falsifiable. If they are not, then they are basically worthless.

I really don't think I hauled this thread over from the far side. At least not intentionally.

The original thread was in 'Foraging on the Far Side'. This is all your fault!

Well, if you insist, I'm more than happy to pick up any blame/credit you'd like to proffer. Whatever my intentions were, the result is the same, isn't it? Now, where the thread belongs is something of a different matter. That depends again on one's personal view point which depends on one's personal Belief System, which to any non-adherent to the same beliefs (i.e. faith, religion, call-it-what-you-want) may well be just a stinky load of bull $h1t. Nevertheless, we can all have a rollicking good time in the ensuing give-and-take, wouldn't you say? Also, we can fling either poo or custard pies, our choice. Personally, I greatly prefer the latter over the former—but that's just me. Judging from your comments, J. Oak, I'd say your preference is the same, but let's see how good your aim is!**

So Steve—"The inexplicable merely = the inexplicable until evidence is provided that renders it no longer inexplicable." That's quite true, but the problematic word is 'until', which can be a very long time, and dependant on a bunch of factors like cultural readiness, level of technology, zeitgeist, etc., etc. Geo- vs. Heliocentrism (and Galileo and Dutch telescopes, and Roman Catholic Europe) all come to mind. Just when evidence is enough evidence and of the right sort (did the provider of the evidence hold his tongue ever-so-correctly while he was gathering it?) is highly problematic in itself, and once again depends very much on one's BS

To some degree, we —all of us—see what we want to see and don't see what we don't want to see. To what degree depends on the individual's investment in the outcome of what's being considered.

** As an important historical footnote: Stan Laurel (Laurel & Hardy) was the undisputed Pie Fling King. With unerring accuracy he could put a pie in the face a 15' distant target while looking and facing cross-wise to the same! Such mastery!

Yes, this is true of a lot of superstition and mumbo-jumbo. All it takes is a bit of faith.

Do you have any idea how dismissive this sounds? And arrogant? Well, maybe you do, come to think of it. If scoffing at that which you can't understand, or do, or experience is OK by your belief system who am I to argue against it? I just don't share your BS, and that's fine, isn't it? Many folks have never experienced love, or the color magenta, and I suppose that some of them likewise scoff at the very idea of those phenomenas' existances. Whatever. No argument there either.

Here's Andy (and I) stating we can and do use L-bent coat hanger wires to find buried water pipes, a tool lost in the tall grass, a N-S-E-W grid pattern, etc. But he's humble enough to be at least skeptical of his own skepticism. All of us exercise faith all day long. We're so steeped in it that many (materialists in particular) don't even realize they are, like a fish not aware of it's wetness. Do you and Madasafish not see how much faith it takes to fully believe that Andy and I are either inveterate liars, somewhat wacko, or any combination of the two, while never having even met us personally, let alone gone out in the back yard for a demonstration and lesson? That's how I learned, BTW, and it takes me about 15 min. to show someone else how to do it. But then maybe Andy's suggestion is correct, and he, I, and our respective coat hangers are all just holograms projected onto the backsides of our cerebral cortexes from somewhere in deep space? Who knows?
Charlie

I have to say, Andy and Charlie are to be congratulated for putting up a very good argument and I am certainly swayed more by their input than that of the gainsayers, despite being in the cynics camp to start with. I'm not easily converted but I can see the logic in your discussion. I don't have time to mess with it at the moment, but you have inspired me sufficiently to be prepared to have a go.

Can I suggest this thread is moved to 'foraging on the far side' or whatever it is called. I am going to delete my posts as I think Charlie asked a simple question about frequency which should be answered by positive comment not negative. Those who do not believe in electro magnetic grids or the like can then stay in the bits of the forum they enjoy and those of us who might enjoy this aspect of how we perceive the world can contribute to it. Sounds fair to me. Charlie what do you think.... I am heading for the door.....
A

Not sure where this thread should be housed but please don't delete any of your posts. This took an amazingly interesting path that may eventually get to an answer for the OP. There is much to learn in the spectrum of belief systems which beekeepers participate.

Andy, I would also be very disappointed and feel the topic would lose a lot of content, if you deleted your posts.
Hopefully Charlie will chip in and confirm that he does not wish your contribution to be removed. I get the feeling he is just happy to provoke further discussion of this whole topic, rather than just get a simple answer to his initial question (which we all know is not likely to happen anyway!)

I find it surprising that people get so emotive about this subject. There is no need for people to subscribe to this thread if they do not wish to, but it is interesting that it draws some people to deride it so strongly, when it would be just as easy(more so in fact), to ignore it.

Sorry as far as I am concerned we had an 18+ page thread on this of which probably half was what I would consider less than constructive comments.

I am interested in talking about this but from an open positive mind and I feel that this thread has got off onto the wrong foot already.

So if we can start again in a part of the forum where it is generally accepted that we discuss things that are a little less conventional to the modern western mindset and method then we can probably work out some reasonable scientific method of actually determining what it is we are talking about. Knowledge has to start from somewhere and we have been around a long time so sure some of this particular topic gets a bit of the super natural which we will have to leave in our wake.

Lets talk about this somewhere else on the forum and try to answer the original question posted on this thread.
A

I think that's an excellent suggestion Andy and, speaking personally, I have no objections if people who share a commonly held non-scientific belief wish to discuss aspects of it without it being constantly questioned by tiresome rationalists like myself or, worse, where those who hold such beliefs are ridiculed. The latter of which is certainly something I would not do, at least not intentionally. To that extent, a section of the forum set up specifically for the purpose where it is common courtesy for others who do not hold such beliefs to not critically interject, might be a good idea.

It's not up to me though Andy as, although I am technically admin, that title and the forum powers it confers on me are really only for the purpose of more efficiently dealing with things like spam. I or Barbara can have a word with Phil, though, and see what he has to say.

Fair enough?

In the meantime, I wont be contributing anything further to this thread.

As to this thread being moved, particularly how I feel about that— well, since it's already been moved there's not much point in offering an opinion, other than 'sure, why not.' I can certainly see the advantage of being freer to wander around in the meadow's far side rather than being leashed to the original thread's topic.

Barbara and Steve: I greatly appreciate your self-honesty and openness to the occasional oddity of ideas. If one is to be a true rationalist, he or she has to always stay on guard against the irrationalizing effects of Received Dogma, Convention and the Mainstream Drift. Because these effects are slow—glacially so—its easy to ooze into irrationality unawares.

Andy— If you delete your posts I'M GONNA COME OVER THERE AND QIVE YOU A GOOD SMACK UP SIDE THE HEAD, IF I HAVE TO SWIM THE ATLANTIC TO DO IT! Consider yourself forewarned.

Natural beekeepers run the risk of being considered cranks and nutters.

This thread in my view confirms that risk. There is no scientific and independently verified evidence for any of the views expressed by Dr Hartman.

Given that much is made on this site - rightly in my view - of the lack of independence of many chemical companies claims for their products, it seems incredible and doing it a great disservice to countenance it.

We do not expect people to provide scientific justification for their opinions on this forum, although it is always useful to have a reference for data or research to demonstrate the veracity of a factual statement.

We do expect discussions to remain the right side of well-mannered and ad hominem attacks are a punishable offence.

We do not fight shy of debating controversial subjects - whatever their provenance - but please play nicely.

Natural beekeepers run the risk of being considered cranks and nutters.

This thread in my view confirms that risk.

Well, so what? Analyze the risks. What's the worst the skeptical "Theys" can do here—take away a curious investigator's birthday or something? No amateur risks getting his career damaged, nor has he any outside funding to get yanked away. Sure, a professional would have to exercise a good deal of discretion, but he can still engage in a considerable amount of 'underground' research.

Quote:

There is no scientific and independently verified evidence for any of the views expressed by Dr Hartman.

But there's a great deal of anecdotal evidence that some sort of grid exists, and that it can be detected and delineated by many ordinary, simple people (like me) using ordinary simple tools. Lacking pure scientific evidence of the highest quality one can still get started with anecdotal evidence if that's the only thing available.
The very demand, by its circular nature, for evidentiary perfection is a form of self-fulfilling prophecy. It tends to chill and squash right from the outset all tentative and cautious probing into the phenomenon; if such investigation were instead encouraged, it might very well lead to 'proper' scientific evidence and ultimately to significant advances in our understanding of the natural world.

Quote:

Given that much is made on this site - rightly in my view - of the lack of independence of many chemical companies claims for their products, it seems incredible and doing it a great disservice to countenance it.

You lost me here. What do the 3 'its' (it seems incredible; doing it; countenance it) each refer to. Could you explain this a bit more?

But there's a great deal of anecdotal evidence that some sort of grid exists, and that it can be detected and delineated by many ordinary, simple people (like me) using ordinary simple tools. Lacking pure scientific evidence of the highest quality one can still get started with anecdotal evidence if that's the only thing available.

Oh dear, I did say I wasn't going to contribute to this thread didn't I Charlie. But, I feel compelled to respond to your post. Oh well, here goes...

Please explain precisely what you mean by "anecdotal evidence". Might I hazard a guess that you mean evidence that constitutes the unfalsifiable reports of dowsers of their own achievements in dowsing? If you do, then I would like to take this opportunity to present to you some anecdotal evidence I am omnipotent. The anecdotal evidence is merely my having told you so since I do not need to demonstrate my omnipotence has been independently verified do I? My anecdotal reporting of it to you is quite sufficient, right? You could, of course, replace my claim of omnipotence with claims of having seen ghosts, of the universe having been created by a spaghetti monster etc etc etc

I'm not being facetious or trying to be a smart-arse here, Charlie, I sincerely assure you. For me, the above is the central problem of communication that exists between people on your side of the rationalist fence and people on my side of it. For people on my side, we really do need evidence that constitutes more than merely the non falsifiable anecdotal reports of individuals. Without it, any sense of commonly held valid beliefs becomes a nonsense, Though, of course, it is entirely possible for such commonly held beliefs to be reliability held. but that's not the same thing as them being valid. For example, it is a commonly held belief by some fundamentalist Christians that Darwinian evolution does not exists despite overwhelming and voluminous evidence to the contrary and, whilst that belief may well be reliably held in common by them, their belief is nevertheless invalid. In short, believing something to be true and telling other people it is true because one believes it, does not demonstrate its truthfulness. The only thing that can do that is independently verifiable evidence. None of which matters very much, of course, when such a belief has no effect on others. but, when it does, then it does matter. Or, if one wishes to discuss such topics on a public forum such as this, people who might consider themselves rationalists are more or less duty bound to respond.

Now, don't misunderstand me here. I do accept that bodies of shared cultural knowledge can accumulate over time based on series' of anecdotal observations/actions. Herbal medicine in many cultures down the ages being one example. We might conceptualise this kind of knowledge acretion as a form of cultural Darwinism where, bit, by bit, pieces of knowledge are added (or lost) to the cultural whole based upon their best fittedness to the environment in which they exist. That kind of knowledge is entirely based upon reliability as opposed to validity. However, if it manages to hang around long enough, it is usually because it is also valid as well as reliable and so, in such cases, reliability and validity become essentially synonymous. Nevertheless, this kind of knowledge is till apt to persist on occasion despite there being zero validity to it. A belief in the aphrodisiac properties of rhino horn being one example.

Quote:

The very demand, by its circular nature, for evidentiary perfection is a form of self-fulfilling prophecy. It tends to chill and squash right from the outset all tentative and cautious probing into the phenomenon

There is no demand for evidential perfection Charlie. That's a red herring. Just a demand that a given claim that can be independently verified. Or, to use a more technical term; is falsifiable. That's all. The "tentative and cautious probing" you mention is called a hypothesis and such hypothesising is actively encouraged by rationalist analyses. It only becomes "chilled" and "squashed" if the evidence persistently points to it not being true. Further, to ascribe that demand to science alone is also a red herring. Such a demand is just logical common sense.

Extraordinary claims (such as the existence of a Hartman grid and the implied requirement for bee-keepers to account for its existence in their bee-keeping practices) require extraordinary evidence Charlie. Unfalsifiable, anecdotal, self-reporting of dowsers doesn’t constitute such evidence.

Can I just finally add, Charlie, that all of the above is posted as a user on this forum like anyone else and neither you nor anyone else should view my status as admin on here as being reason not to tear my arguments to shreds if you don't agree with them....

Last edited by stevecook172001 on Mon Aug 25, 2014 10:37 am; edited 2 times in total

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Quality Top Bar Hives by Andrew Vidler

Conserving wild bees

Research suggests that bumble bee boxes have a very low success rate in actually attracting bees into them. We find that if you create an environment where first of all you can attract mice inside, such as a pile of stones, a drystone wall, paving slabs with intentionally made cavities underneath, this will increase the success rate.

Most bumble bee species need a dry space about the size a football, with a narrow entrance tunnel approximately 2cm in diameter and 20 cm long. Most species nest underground along the base of a linear feature such as a hedge or wall. Sites need to be sheltered and out of direct sunlight.